The "hot button" issue of abortion is trumpeted by a minority of candidates -- even some Republicans with a pro-life record avoid the issue. Yet, pro-life organizations continue to back such stealth pro-life candidates, as some social conservative strategists believe it's a losing position.
Voters should scrutinize their local candidates' positions; some previously pro-life politicians have wiped "abortion" from their websites.
UPDATE 9/9/10: Mississippi Governor Hailey Barber says pro-life advocates should ditch social issues.
UPDATE 8/17/10: Why conservatives have abandoned The Culture War (commentary)
-- From "Election 2010 Heats Up For Pro-Life Groups, 100 Days Until November Elections" by Steven Ertelt, LifeNews.com Editor 7/26/10
With just months before polls open -- and less time in states with early voting -- the push is on now by pro-life groups and political organization to get involved.
House Minority Leader John Boehner, a pro-life Ohio Republican, says now is the time for those upset with the pro-abortion health care bill Obama and his allies approved to stand up.
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From "Abortion provision threatens Dems" by Jeanne Cummings, Politico 7/27/10
Freshman Rep. Kathleen Dahlkemper (D-Pa.) seemed destined for a tough reelection campaign from the moment she was sworn into office two years ago.
Now, the issues of health care and abortion could make Dahlkemper’s campaign against Republican Mike Kelly even tougher.
The question being debated: Will the reform of the health care system create a loophole that allows taxpayer money to fund abortions? The White House says it won’t; abortion opponents say it will.
[Marilyn Musgrave, a former Colorado congresswoman who is project director of the Votes Have Consequences campaign for the conservative women’s group Susan B. Anthony List,] will be targeting Ohio Rep. Steve Driehaus and Indiana Reps. Joe Donnelly and Brad Ellsworth, who is running for Senate. Musgrave said Rep. Alan Mollohan of West Virginia was also a target of her campaign, and he was defeated in the Democratic primary by anti-abortion candidate Mike Oliverio.
Meanwhile, Democrats for Life has launched a website aimed at refuting mischaracterizations about the law and highlighting the Whole-Life Heroes, the 16 anti-abortion Democrats who backed the reform bill.
David Kozak, a political scientist at Gannon University in Erie, Pa., said the outcome of the abortion skirmish could have an impact on the race.
As with many things in politics, money could influence the effectiveness of the issue campaigns.
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From "Abortion returns to campaign forefront" by Sean Lengell, Washington Times 7/19/10
An Obama administration effort to rein in states treading toward using new health care laws to fund abortions - and provide political cover for pro-life Democrats - reignited a politically explosive issue that Republicans and pro-life activists are eager to exploit in the lead-up to the fall midterm elections.
The thorny abortion issue almost derailed President Obama's health care overhaul earlier this year, as many conservative House Democrats threatened to withhold support if the measure called for spending federal dollars on abortions.
House Minority Leader John A. Boehner and other Ohio Republicans on Monday sent a letter to Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland urging him not to include elective abortions as a covered benefit.
Nancy Keenan, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, a leading abortion rights group, called the Obama administration's exclusion of abortion coverage from newly created high-risk pools "wrongheaded and inexplicable."
[Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative-leaning think tank] added, however, that in an election cycle dominated by the sluggish economy and high unemployment, abortion will have little impact when voters go to the polls in November.
"This is not going to be the factor that determines these elections, even at the margins," he said. What will "is a combination of the pessimism that people are feeling about the state of the world."
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